Three cool things about Iron Man

Now, obviously I'm talking about the pre-Civil-War Iron Man, and not the Iron Man we've seen since all that started--who, by the way, I fully expect to be revealed when all this is over as a Skrull or a robot or a depraved clone, or at least a victim of sinister mind control.

1. The armor, of course. The armor is cool. Also the notion that the man in the armor is, after all, a human being. (Well, before Extremis came along...hey, could that be the reason for his Civil War arrogance? Hm.)

This was more explicit in the early days of the comic, when Tony was literally trapped in the armor--he couldn't remove the chest plate because the chest plate was what kept his injured heart beating. I always wondered how he managed to maintain his playboy rep after that happened--even given the 60s comic book version of being a playboy (which apparently involved kissing the girl goodnight at her door when the date was over), you'd think any woman he danced with would have figured out that something was up.

2. The romance. Tony had, in the 60s and 70s, a long line of girlfriends. There's a scene in an early book where Tony is missing and a large group of women assembles at his factory to express their concern--the security guard assumes they're his fan club, but no, they're his girlfriends. Of course, the woman he really loved was Pepper Potts*, his trusted secretary. Unfortunately, he could never be with her because of the armor that kept him separate from the world (and handily free from intimacy!), not to mention the issue of her safety if anyone were to find out he was Iron Man. (Oh yeah, back then no one knew that Tony Stark was Iron Man, and he actually put a bit of effort into keeping it that way.) So, lots of angsty angsty angst! Eventually Pepper got tired of waiting for Tony and married Happy Hogan, Tony's bodyguard. Possibly they're still married, I have no idea.

3. He is deeply, deeply flawed. Tony isn't perfect, never has been. Yeah, there's the alcoholism. But he also has a tendency to be very self-focused, to be a workaholic and disappear for days on end--sometimes ignoring his corporate responsibilities.

And when it comes to women, he makes remarkably poor choices--remember in the Avengers when he got together with the just-divorced and emotionally fragile Wasp? His co-worker in the Avengers? Who didn't know he was Iron Man? Captain America, who did know his secret identity, called him on this. Tony did the right thing and told her, and she called off the relationship. (Probably why he didn't tell her in the first place.)

And then there was the one who shot him.

And then there was the super-villain.

Some people should just go to Eharmony.


* Silver Age Soap Opera: When Pepper Potts first appeared, she was a cute, freckle-faced thing with a crush on her boss. Because she was not a glamour queen (his usual "type"), Tony never gave her a second glance other than as a valued employee. Happy Hogan, of course, thought she was the bee's knees, but Pepper was focused on Tony. Now, what one would hope for would be this scenario: Tony eventually sees Pepper's true beauty and goodness and comes around. Nope. No interest from Tony until Pepper went to the beauty shop for a full makeover. Mainly they redid her hair and put makeup over her freckles, I think, but suddenly she was gorgeous and Tony dug her. Happy thought she looked better before the change, but he still liked her because he's that kind of guy. I'm afraid that when it came to women, Silver Age Tony was about as deep as a birdbath. He couldn't be interested in Pepper until she matched his physical ideal.

Happy himself, incidentally, was also a very different character at that time--he made his debut as a washed-up boxer, not terribly bright but terribly stereotypical, with a working-class dialect and a face that had clearly hit the mat a few times. By the time he and Pepper got together, however, he had apparently been to both a plastic surgeon and elocution school (seemingly overnight), because only if he too had the movie-star looks could he be a realistic romantic partner to Pepper. Apparently Tony wasn't the only shallow individual running around Tales of Suspense...

Comics to Remember: The Cat #1

When I was a little girl picking through the books on the comic rack for something new, I'd snatch up anything I saw featuring a female hero. I bought the original Spider-woman in 1978, all 50 issues. I bought the first Ms. Marvel title in 1977, all 23 issues. (Granted that I was a teenager then, not really a little girl anymore.)

But in 1972 I was ten years old, not nearly as focused in my comic-buying, and I bought the first issue of The Cat. Since I was also not nearly as organized in my comic-collecting, this comic disappeared somewhere along the line, but I remember it well. (Thus the title "Comics to Remember.") Well, memory is fallible, so I may well be off on some of the details, but the book impressed me a great deal.

Here's the story: Greer Nelson is a hopefully-not-too-typical young woman of the early 70s. She's far from a feminist, barely complaining at all when her fiance Bill refuses to let her drive her own car (a gift from her father) because he'd feel silly in the passenger seat. She and Bill (who wasn't all that bad of a guy, just a heavy-duty chauvinist--of course, ten-year-old Brainfreeze thought he was a big jerk, but looking back I don't think that was the intent) marry, and Greer begins her life as a full-time housewife, ready for the anticipated happy-ever-after.

Unfortunately, Bill is a police officer, a risky profession, and he's killed in the line of duty. Greer is heartbroken, of course, but also has no idea what to do next--I don't think she gave much thought to her future other than as a wife (and eventually mother, presumably) and now that was over. She found employment as a lab assistant to Dr. JoAnne Tumulo (yes, I had to look up the name online!), who provided her with powers and a nifty costume. After Tumulo herself was (apparently) killed, Greer took on the identity of The Cat and started doing battle against a series of mid-level villains. Since The Cat only ran four issues, this stage of her career didn't last as long as it might have*, but did she ever capture the imagination of a ten-year-old girl! I read that comic until it was falling apart.

Although I liked both Ms. Marvel and Spider-Woman very much, neither book grabbed me in the same way that The Cat did. Part of this probably had to do with the difference between a ten-year-old and a teenager. And part of that had to do with the strong female focus of the book--Greer was a woman. The doctor who gave her her powers was a woman. The book's author (Linda Fite) was a woman. The book's artist (Marie Severin) was a woman. A ten-year-old girl who has only ever seen men's names on that first page notices these things.

I liked Greer as The Cat, honestly, better than I liked her as Tigra. (And I liked Tigra, don't get me wrong there!) With the transformation she traded some of her earnestness for Tigra's protective humor, her practicality for an exotic look. (Tigra does seem to be a hard character for writers to get a handle on--her portrayal in West Coast Avengers was one of the few things I really didn't care for in that series.) And it may be that if her series had gone on longer, or if she'd stayed The Cat longer before becoming Tigra, I wouldn't have quite such fond memories of her--but she didn't, and I do. I think there may also have been the element of watching this helpless, childlike person pull herself up and become strong and self-sufficient--that's something a ten-year-old can both admire and relate to.

*Eventually Greer was transformed (somehow) into Tigra, and eventually her costume made its way to Patsy Walker, who wore it for a time as Hellcat.

Why I still love superheroes

I've never given up on comics. Not entirely. I've gone through periods, sometimes of years, where I stopped buying them (the mid-90s precipitated the last such period), but I've never for a moment considered getting rid of my old books because, on some level, I knew I'd be back.

Omitting the nostalgia factor (because I'm honestly not all that sentimental), and ignoring the possibility of an arrested development factor :), of course.

When I was a kid, I was the audience for comics. I may even have been a bit young for the Marvel books I preferred when I first picked up a comic. I was lucky--to a certain extent comics evolved so that by the time I was a teenager comics were aimed at a slightly older age group (i.e. me). I kept with them through college, for the most part. I kept with them after I was married, right up until crossovers and foil covers sent me running. (It's no good having your favorite characters appear in a slew of books if all they do is stand in the background and look menacing, which is all they get to do when there's a guest cast of fifty. Crossovers meant no character development, no character interplay. No character work meant no interest on my part.)

You know, though...I'm over 40 now. I'm married. I have kids. Even with the age of the current intended comic audience, I'm probably something like 20 years past it. Shouldn't I be reading, I don't know, Tom Clancy novels or Good Housekeeping? Maybe some Steven King? (Although I liked King when I was younger, after Cujo I pretty much gave up on him. When it comes to non-graphic literature I tend to read historical non-fiction, although I have a thing for Nero Wolfe books as well, and at one time was an avid science fiction fan.)

I don't think it's the combination of words and pictures, because if that were the case I'd be reading non-superhero comics as well, even manga, which bores me to tears. And I'm not.

It's not the fighting, because although there's something cathartic in it (especially if you're in a bad mood when you pick the book up), if a book is all battles, it's boring.

It's not the costumes. (You know, I'm just not going to talk about costumes right now. :))

It's not, goodness knows, the plots.

It's not, despite what I said earlier, the characterization, although this is definitely an essential element--seeing real-world concerns play out against a fantastic background.

There are plenty of things I don't care about--could the Hulk beat Superman in a fight?--which seem to put me outside of the mainstream of comic fandom.

It seems a little strange, but some of what I enjoy most about comics is stereotypically girlie stuff--relationships, personal development, character growth.

But on its own that stuff is unappealing--I've never been a fan of soap operas or romance novels, and I generally detest romantic comedies and other relationship-focused films. On its own that sort of thing is deadly dull. (I love Law and Order, where the meat is the plot and personal stuff is barely there unless you look hard--it flavors the show but is not its core. I generally dislike similar shows where the characters' personal lives take up more screen time than the plot.) But as a part of something else (the battles, the plots, the shapeshifting aliens, the awesome armor, the interdimensional travel between sections of the multiverse) it's interesting because it's not all that's going on.

I need to care about the characters. If there's not enough individualized personal stuff going on, I won't--why should I care about Gecko Girl and her sidekick Salamander Lad saving the Brooklyn Bridge if all I know about them is that they like saving bridges and hanging out at the Lizard Lair? On the other hand, if there's too much personal stuff going on, that's also no good--why should I care about a story that's nothing but Gecko Girl shopping for shoes and skeet-shooting with her best bud the Flying Ferret?

On the whole, comics--the comics I tend to stick with--strike a reasonable balance. Not necessarily in every issue, but over a period of several issues you'll get enough about the character to make you want to see what s/he does next, and enough good story to maintain your interest in the character. Possibly the pictures-and-words combination helps with this; I feel firmly that what you see in the art is as much a part of the story as are the words (if Gecko Girl is shown scowling while the word balloon says "Gosh, Salamander Lad, you did a fine job changing the tire on the Geckomobile this afternoon!" you know perfectly well that there's something going on there and it's not going to go well for Salamander Lad) which makes it possible for character aspects to be portrayed more subtly.

(This really has been difficult to discuss without mentioning the nostlgia factor, by the way! I may have to get into specifics in the future. :))

Favorite comic moment of the month

Does anyone know if there's going to be a Secret Six ongoing series after the miniseries is done? Because if it's going to have scenes like this:



I will buy it forever.

(A fight breaks out and Scandal takes off her heels. She does not attempt to do battle wearing three-inch heels. Impressed, I was. :))

Thoughts on linkage

So probably you've been following the recent brouhaha about appropriate linking behavior among blogs. I'm not going to talk about that specific case, but the whole thing has gotten me thinking about link etiquette and all that.

Historically, I think there may have been a tradition of asking first before linking. I say this because I've received (in the past, not within the last five years or so) requests from other sites asking if they could link to my site. I always thought this was a little odd, and often took it as a genteel and somewhat passive way of asking me to link to their site. But it may have been something that was more common in the net's earlier days, I don't really know (and I've been on the net for a few years now). I think it may also have been more common within certain sorts of net community, particularly those where folks tend to get more personal in their intereactions in addition to whatever topical focus there may be. (F'rex, you see a lot of that in crafting communities, quilting and so forth.) In less close-knit communities it seems to matter less.

My real point here, though, is that I think you have to differentiate between sorts of links.

A link in your sidebar is a recommendation of sorts; whether this indicates that a linked site is one that mirrors your own views, one that is informational, or (as in my own case) means simply "ooh! ooh! a blog about comics!" Some folks indicate the nature of their permanent links by describing them or by grouping them with similar sites. Others, the lazy folks (as I like to refer to myself :)), just pile them all up, alphabetically or not. When I've had informational (non-personal, non-blog) websites in the past, I've usually set up a separate page of links, divided by category, because the list is as much for my own use as for the "hey, you should read this!" thing. I try to do some of that on my Brainfreeze blog, and keep meaning to subdivide further but have never gotten around to it. (I will admit that grouping all "comic blogs" together is pretty unhelpful, even to me.) Because there are some awesome comic blogs out there, you know who you are :). Sidebar links are like the Links Page on a non-blog website, they're static.

A link within a post is usually a referential link, which is very different. It's used to point out an example of something you're discussing (or possibly a stand-alone point of interest within a blog or other site), and isn't necessarily a recommended site, although it can be and often is. It's more likely to be to a specific post of a blog rather than to the blog's main page. It's more likely to have specific commentary. In other words, the reason the link is there is usually obvious either by context or from discussion. There's no recommendation being made of the site as a whole, and there's no presumption made on the part of the casual viewer that the two sites agree on anything. Referential links are rare in traditional non-blog websites.

I'm relatively new to the Blogger community, but my impression is that the primary community-building aspect here has to do with referential in-post links, and sidebar links are nice but beside the main point in that respect. Otherwise why would sites like Technorati exist? Comments are very rare (especially compared with places like Livejournal, where commenting is one of the primary community-building tools), and links genuinely link, in more ways than the obvious. Possibly that's the source of some of the feeling surrounding the issue?

Kids and comics, yet again

I'm always (well, often) pleased to see comics that are kid-oriented, with age-appropriate material. I don't think the comic rating system is at all a bad thing although in all honesty I find it only marginally useful.

This is in great part because I have kids, and while I wouldn't hand over a comic to my seven-year-old based solely on its All Ages rating, it's a good starting point. It's not only a matter of age-appropriate material as in sex/violence, it's also a matter of kids' stories typically having the story complete in a single issue, and less arty/complex storytelling techniques (because kids haven't been alive long enough to have picked up on the cultural and media references on which so many more complex techniques are based).

That's not the only reason, though. I know that my kids are not the primary customer comic companies have in mind when they're putting a book together. That's fine. A lot of more mainstream (odd to call non-kid-friendly books mainstream, isn't it?) books are perfectly fine for the twelve-year-old (yes, she had a birthday since I last mentioned her). I read them first. (Oh, such hardship...!*) I read them, but they're not generally my favorite books of the month because, well, I like the less explicitly kid-friendly titles. You know, because I'm not a kid. There's room for both, right?

*All right, granted that most parents aren't going to find it as much fun as I do to read comics, particularly if all they get out of it is an idea of whether their kid should read it. But it's what you do.

But I know what I like...

When I was a kid, back in the 70s, I didn't notice the art in the comics I read. It was probably mostly Kirby and Buscema, given that I was a Marvel reader, but I didn't think much about it, paying attention to the story instead. I might have noticed if the art was particularly bad, but other than that it was just there to illustrate the stories. I was, and am, no artist; I was, and am, no art expert. At some point, however, when a particular artist was drawing one of the books I read, I noticed. That point would have been when George Perez took over The Avengers.

Not that there was anything wrong with the artists I'd seen earlier. I've since developed a greater appreciation for John Buscema, Don Heck and George Tuska, and I much prefer Kirby's earlier (if you can call the 70s "earlier" when you're talking about Kirby) to his later massive cosmic stuff, but it was Perez who got me to notice the art as something separate from the story--something worth noticing on its own. Not that it was intrusive in any way, just that it was so damn gorgeous! I started to look at the pictures that went with the words instead of simply using them as reference. I remember just staring at the art after I'd read the comic, something I'd never done before. (And yes, I'm still thrilled when I book I read has Perez art. Although I don't seek out books because he's the artist. Nor do I often seek them out because of the writer, although that has happened on occasion.)

After that, I started to notice the art more often. In Legion of Superheroes I thought Dave Cockrum was awesome, and later was impressed with the facial detail of Mike Grell (although even then I was less impressed with his heroes below the neck). I also remember the startling stylistic jump when LSH changed artists from James Sherman to Joe Staton.

Cockrum again on X-Men, back when there was still just the one X-title. When John Byrne started drawing the X-Men (and I know what folks say about him, but back then who knew?) I noticed that as well, although when he took over the Fantastic Four later I was less impressed.

Jim Starlin was enough to get me to buy Marvel's Captain Marvel despite my lack of interest in the cosmic thing. (Also despite his tendency to draw characters in oddly crouching poses, although that could have been due to lack of gravity...)

Now? 20+ years later? Well, the art on the whole has improved, although I'm not sure I notice it as much now as when I was younger, perhaps because the notable is less exceptional. I do consistently like Steve Epting on Captain America, although his faces are sometimes a bit iffy, by which I mean they sometimes change a bit panel to panel, although they are always expressive and I have no real complaint. Probably my favorite currently is Bryan Hitch, who I love on The Ultimates and who made some of the nicest-looking issues of JLA I've seen.

What I like?

Realism, apparently.

Differentiated faces are important, expressive faces are important. Characters should look like themselves from panel to panel. Characters should have more than one expression and these should be used appropriately.

All heroes not sharing the same body type is important, especially for female characters.

Minimal T&A, although a little gratuitous cheesecake (or beefcake!) does not offend, particularly if there's some of each.

Characters who fight should be well-covered unless invulnerable. If you might be thrown through a plate glass window at some point, you don't want a lot of bare skin exposed.

Minimal non-functional dramatic posing.

Minimal body-builder posing when the character is just standing around doing nothing. Even champion body-builders don't flex when they're washing dishes or having coffee with a friend. If they're not using the muscles, the arms shouldn't be all veiny.

I seem to pay less attention to background detail, although I do note it when it's missing. (And I'm always pleased to see a messy room, or one that has some individual detail, in a hero's apartment.)

Content-wise, I like the downtime sequences of the story to be as well done as the action sequences.

Bad art distracts. Good art supports. I have never quit a book because of the art, but I can see it happening. I still think that the story is most important. I buy comics for the story. I'll enjoy them more (and possibly more likely to keep them on the pull list when the budget indicates a cut is advisable) if the art is also good, but if the story is bad I'll have dropped it long before.

Marvel Legends Action Figures: Young Avengers Set

The set includes the four original Young Avengers characters with their original costumes and code names, Patriot, Asgardian, Iron Lad, and Hulkling. It does not, much to the girls' disappointment, include any of the later additions such as Giant Girl and Kate/Hawkeye (are they really going to keep calling her Hawkeye? that's just not right!). The kids are not happy about the lack of female heroes and hope that they'll come out eventually, although I don't suppose I'd hold my breath on that one.


Asgardian
The kids thought this one looked the best. Very slender (makes sense for a younger hero), flexible, posable, looks good. Comes with a staff and a bag. His cape looks very good, which surprised me a bit, but tends to shift around some, a potential playability problem but nothing major. Great face, well detailed.

Hulkling
Good flexibility despite being so muscular. No mobility issues I've been able to find. Playable. Good design. The face is excellent.

Iron Lad
The least favored figure of this set, primarily because of playability issues--he doesn't have that extendable shoulder that most action figures do these days. The armor looks decent apart from the bands at the wrist and ankle, which don't. He also lacks full waist movement and can only turn a bit in either direction because the armor gets in the way. Finally, as far as I can tell, the toes are stuck--the joint is there but shows no sign of moving, and I don't want to take a chance on breaking them off so I haven't tested it much.

Patriot
Voted most playable by my daughters, he's well articulated and his joints are neither too loose nor too tight. He's slender (as a teenager) but muscular (therefore not easily broken). Very posable. Comes with a plastic shield.

Caveat Emptor and all that

In the line of duty, our Ms Marvel action figure has been decapitated. The neck cracked and the head fell off. A lot of the female figures are more delicate (read: fragile) than the male, due to their unreasonable lack of muscle mass, and I'd really have expected this one to break at the arm if anywhere, since her biceps are multi-jointed sticks.

So there was some sorrow from the seven-year-old until the eleven-year-old got some wire and did a quick fix; the head is loose but still moves, and rides a bit higher than it used to, and certainly they'll need to be extra-careful with her, but she can return to reasonably active play now, although she should probably live at the top of the toybox.

Who Wants To Be A Superhero, Final Week [Spoilers]

I'll admit that last week's episode was probably the one that held my interest the most--of the two remaining candidates, Feedback and Fat Momma, I didn't have a strong preference for one or the other, and would have been equally satistifed with the outcome had either one won. The kids, on the other hand, were genuinely excited about it, particularly the seven-year-old--although neither had a favorite at this point, either.

There was only one test in this episode. The heroes were taken to "stunt school," where they were to show how they would appear on TV (flying, leaping, etc.). Feedback, unsurprisingly, was far more athletic than Fat Momma; however, Fat Momma is quicker than she looks and was the winner in the combat sequence. The seven-year-old says she did good. This test was different from most of the others in that it focused on who would be most suitable to win the prize (the movie and comic book) rather than on more general superhero characteristics or character.

The last half of the show was taken up with Stan's decision--a big celebration at Universal Citywalk, with bright lights, fireworks, an audience, and the showing of special-effects clips of the heroes flying, jumping, fighting crime, and using their powers. (Presumably the actual SciFi Channel movie will have better effects. :)) And the winner is...

Feedback. This really wasn't surprising, and in fact I wouldn't be surprised if Stan had been secretly rooting for him for several weeks, because he's someone whose life was touched in a real way by comic books (the early death of his father leading him to look to Spider-Man as a role model), and honestly I don't think it would have meant as much to any of the other contestants. (Although I was still a little bummed last week when Major Victory was eliminated...)

Now of course we all wonder whether they'll be doing another season, and while it would be nice, I'm not sure they could duplicate the quality of this series. The eleven-year-old says that if they do a second season, they should look for a sidekick for Feedback; that might in fact work, although I'm not sure whether having kids (or even teens) on a reality show would be workable.